


Chocolate Hearts

by Iamacat



Category: LazyTown
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Meddling Kids, Robbie in disguise, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff, childhood crushes, one-sided crushes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-02-15
Packaged: 2018-09-24 20:19:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9784715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iamacat/pseuds/Iamacat
Summary: Sportacus is fine standing on the sidelines watching everyone else celebrate Valentine's Day every year. But that's in the past. This year, Stephanie is in Lazytown, and she has the kind of gumption to inspire him to do the one thing he never thought he'd ever be brave enough to do: ask Robbie to be his valentine!





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to indigorose50 for giving me the idea for this fic and for being a beta! She's super awesome so go check out her work. Like, go do that. Now. This tab can wait. 
> 
> I know it's past Valentine's Day but I am still within the boundaries of February so I believe it still counts. This is going to be a whole lot of fluff with the kids getting excited over crushes and Robbie up to his usual tricks and Sportacus going whichever way the wind blows him.

A light snow had fallen overnight, draping everything- the quiet streets, the empty playground, the gently waking cul-de-sacs- with a sheet of perfect whiteness. The new snow crunched beneath Sportacus’s boots as he touched down and inhaled deeply. At elevation, the air was always brisk, but on the ground it had an invigorating crispness to it. The way the smell of snow and smoke filled his lungs, it seemed to alert him to something that he needed to do. It’s time to move, time to run, time to go where you need to be, not stand here getting cold. During the wintertime, LazyTown residents were particularly slow to rouse themselves from their warm beds, if they ever managed at all, but this morning Sportacus didn’t just want to be outside, he wanted to be outside  early . So that was how he found himself jogging through the empty streets when the sun was still tinging the snow a rosy pinkish hue and even the most active resident of Lazytown was still in her pajamas.

“Good morning, Sportacus!” Stephanie called from her window. She waved with her whole arm, smiling cheerily against the white puff of breath hanging in front of her face. Sportacus waved back.

“Good morning, Stephanie. May I?” He gestured to her fence and she nodded, so he deftly jumped over it to her window. “You look happy this morning. Do you have something fun planned today?” Ever since Stephanie had arrived the previous summer, not a day had gone by where she didn’t make the most of her days. Even as the carefree summer days shortened into autumn, then winter, she was happily active, playing and tending her garden and helping her friends. 

Her face was flushed and well-rested this morning. She beamed, tucked her hands behind her back, and rocked on the balls of her feet. “Well, it is Valentine’s Day.” 

Yes, yes it was. He had seen it marked on his calendar when he’d woken up. Every year his feelings about the day seemed to be muddled and mixed like the slush melting at his feet. What could be bad about it? A day for people and friends to let each other know how much the care about one another! For one day the world became red and pink with heartfelt cards and bouquets to warm sweethearts against the remaining cold weeks. He himself received dozens of valentines of various sorts from his older fans, bringing him into the festivities. 

Yet. Remembering it was Valentine’s Day made him want to hold himself back, to resign himself to the sidelines and watch everyone else celebrate.

Stephanie continued, “I’m going to give everyone a little gift bag with a handmade card, some stickers, and their favorite sportscandy.”

“That’s very clever! I’m sure everyone will love their valentines.”

“Hey, Sportacus.” Her voice rose a little in pitch. She tilted her head very slightly to the side. “Can I come running with you? I need to go into town to the store to get more paper so I can finish the cards.”

“Have you had breakfast?” he asked. She shook her head.

“Uncle Milford is making something now. I can grab it on my way out.”

Sportacus crossed his arms. “At least have an apple. And don’t forget to put on your coat. You don’t want to catch a cold today.” He held back a laugh because he was only wearing a scarf with his usual uniform. As he was always moving, he rarely felt cold. And here Stephanie was, standing in her bedroom with her window wide open. Sportacus reached up to pull the window down. “I’ll wait by the front gate.”

“I’ll be five minutes,” she promised, and closed the window all the way before turning back into the house. 

Stephanie popped out of the front door five minutes later bundled up in a pink coat, hat, and gloves and biting into a half-eaten apple. She finished the other half quickly, and together they set off toward Lazytown proper. The shops were not far away. As the mayor, Stephanie’s uncle made sure his home was centrally located near the center of town. Town hall was about half a block away, and the shops not much farther than that. They had gone for jogs together before and easily fell into a familiar rhythm and matched their paces as they followed the curve of the sidewalk to the row of tall, thin yellow and orange buildings with their various product-shaped signs, mostly of fast food and quick treats for the occasional resident who ventured out. 

In the general store, Stephanie picked through the assorted packs of colored construction paper, felt, and pipe cleaners with care while Sportacus watched on curiously. Her face was hardened in concentration, and Sportacus could almost see her mind individualizing each gift in her head. Red for Trixie, dark blue for Ziggy, yellow for Stingy, and orange for Pixel. He couldn’t help but smile at her thoughtfulness, and also envy a little bit her ability to easily know what people liked. Someday she would grow up and truly appreciate the ability to understand people. 

Knowing this, then, it shouldn’t have surprised him the least when she popped up from the shelves of crafting supplies, studied him a moment with her critical eye. “Are you doing anything for Valentine’s Day?”

Sportacus shrugged. “I got up early to go for a run.”

“But you run every day,” Stephanie pointed out. “Uncle Milford is making Miss Busybody a special plate of banana pancakes. Are you going to do anything with someone for Valentine’s?”

“You mean, am I going to ask anyone to be my valentine?” he corrected her. Caught, she sheepishly nodded her head. He thought a moment. “No. Not this year.”

“Oh.” She sounded disappointed. He tried to assuage the mood with a lopsided grin, show it didn’t bother him, but that wouldn’t work when Stephanie set her mind on something. “But you do have a crush on someone.”

A blush crept up Sportacus’s ears, making them tingle beneath his hat. It was the way she had said it, that he  had a crush on someone. Like they were on the playground and he was sneaking peeks from behind the slide, simple and pure. That was a part of it, but it was also more complex than that, and he wasn’t sure if he could explain it to Stephanie yet. He had always made it a policy to be honest with the children, but now for the first time he was tempted to bend that policy as far as he could though his reaction had done enough to confirm her suspicions. “Yes,” he said with a sigh. “I do have a crush on someone.”

She began hopping from foot to foot in glee. Her whole body was tense, eager, leaning in closer. It reminded him vaguely of Bessie at the telephone when she smelled an especially juicy bit of gossip in front of her. “So why don’t you ask her-”

“Him.”

“-  him to be your valentine?” 

Sportacus crossed his arms. “Because I’m too nervous to. I am very bad at picking out presents. I don’t know what to get him for Valentine’s Day that feels right.” He tried to keep it simple for her sake, but it was the first time he had actually thought to put his reluctance into words, let alone say it out loud. He bit his bottom lip. “I want to get him a great gift that expresses my feelings,” he placed a hand flat over his heart, “but everything I pick out seems wrong.”

It might have been the wrong thing to say. Stephanie’s eyes lit up in a whole new way and Sportacus knew what she was thinking before she opened her mouth. “I can help you think of a gift.” 

“Thank you, but I don’t think even a great gift would get him to be my valentine.”

“Why not try? You’ll never know if you don’t ask.” Before he could turn her down more firmly, she placed her fists on her hips, a stance he knew meant that there was no setting her off this course now. In other contexts, it was cute and inspiring to see an ambitious young girl determined to reach a goal, but this morning it only filled him with a sense of uneasiness. Stephanie always meant well when she helped her friends. “You’re always helping me and the others. Let me help you this time. Please?”

“I don’t know.”

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

“He might say no, and then he’d never let me forget that I asked,” he explained. He’d considered it and yes, that was the worst case scenario. Having to go every day remembering he’d been rejected. Stephanie frowned, and for a moment worry creased her young brow before smoothing out again.

“If he does then he’s a bad person. But Sportacus, I don’t think you’d get a crush on someone like that.”

“No. He’s not a bad person.” He was certain of that much.

“Then will you let me help?”

He felt a little out of his depth, standing in the middle of the arts and crafts section of the general store and having Stephanie beg him to help his romantic life. He knew the correct answer would be to let her down gently. He let out a long, deep sigh. “Alright. But if we can’t find a gift, I am not going to ask him to be my valentine, okay?”

“Oh, we’ll find something. Here.” She handed him a pack of construction paper in assorted colors- red, blue, yellow, orange, and purple. “We’ll need these.”


End file.
